7593AN Tali (Sandhills) by Alice Nampitjinpa Dixon, 91x55cm 7593AN

In her evocative work, Alice Nampitjinpa paints Tjukurrpa, the Tali Tali Dreaming, which represents the vast and desolate sandhills of her ancestral land near Taalalpi. Located beyond the Kintore/Kiwikurra road near the West Australian and Northern Territory border, this area holds profound spiritual significance for Alice and her family. It is the landscape where her parents once traveled by foot, and it embodies both personal and tribal law.

Alice's Tali Tali Dreaming features water collected between the sandhills, providing sustenance for her porcupine, her personal tjukurrpa (dreaming). Born in 1943 near Talaalpi, a swamp near Walungurru, Alice spent many years teaching dance and traditions at Kintore School before starting her painting career with the “Minyama Tjukurrpa” – the Kintore Haasts Bluff collaborative canvas project. Her work, inspired by her rich cultural heritage, thrives on storytelling and lore.

Alice's art often showcases the porcupine (Tjilkamala), depicted in bright colours like orange and yellow, reflecting the ochres used in ceremonial body painting. In her tjukurrpa, the porcupine scurries around rock holes and hiding places, while women hunt nearby. Alice, a keen hunter, enjoys going hunting with Eunice Jack.

Her father, the late Uta Uta Tjangala, was an original Papunya Tula painter. His Tjukurrpa, Pungkalungka at Takpalangu, represents dangerous beings living in huge caves. Alice only paints the cave entrances to signify the unknown danger within. Her father’s country, Ngurrapalangu, and her tjukurrpa passed to her, depict the porcupine traveling through the sand hills and passing near two carpet snakes, kuniya kutjarra, living beneath the water.